The formal body of presidential advisers who head the fifteen executive departments. Presidents often add others to this body of formal advisers.

executive agreement

Formal government agreement entered into by the president that does not require the advice and consent of the U.S. senate.

executive office of the president

establishment created in 1939 to help the president oversee the executive branch bureaucracy Ex. important members include the National Security Council

executive order

A rule or regulation issued by the president that has the effect of law. All executive orders must be published in the Federal Register. Ex. Affirmative Action (Lyndon B. Johnson). Significance: Presidents can make policy without legislative approval.

impeachment

the power delegated to the House of Representatives in the Constitution to charge the president, vice president, or other “civil officers,” including federal judges , with “Treason, bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.” This is the first step in the constitutional process of removing such government officials from office.

inherent powers

Powers of the president that can be derived or inferred from specific powers in the Constitution.

line item veto

The authority of a chief executive to delete part of a bill passed by the legislature that involves taxing or spending, The legislature may override a veto, usually with a 2/3 majority of each chamber.

New deal

Office of management and budget (OMB)

Pardon

an executive grant providing restorations of all rights and privileges of citizenship to a specific individual charged or convicted of a crime.

patronage

25th amendment

adopted in 1967 to establish procedures for filling vacancies in the office of president and vice president as well as providing for procedures to deal with the disability of a president.

22 amendment

adopted in 1951, prevents a president from serving more than two terms or more that ten years if he came to office via the death or impeachment of a predecessor.

US V Nixon

Key Supreme Court ruling on power of the president, finding that there is no absolute constitutional executive privilege to allow a president to refuse to comply with a court order to produce information needed in a criminal trial.

veto power

war powers act

passed by Congress in 1973; the president is limited in the deployment of troops overseas to a sixty-day period in peacetime (which can be extended for an extra thirty days to permit withdrawal) unless Congress explicitly gives its approval for a longer period.